Shop's in Shape

 

The only way I could fit into the bedroom is because these older places have very large walk in closets. I took $20 worth of plywood and made it into shelving with minimal intrusion to the closet walls but enough to secure for quakes.

Sets stowed on top shelf, trays of materials for still-needed props on middle shelves, heavy metal card file, with 22 very deep drawers (open drawer on right above is only about 1/3 way pulled open, plus--they come all the way out on a rolling tray, separately.) now with colorfully painted fronts, holds odds and ends for building.

Paints stowed in rolling racks on the floor, long plastic boxes on top of drawers hold puppet/character materials, one box for each of the main seven pupps left to build, their wool hair, their dyed fabrics for costumes, etc,

At the other place, I had acres of raw walls that I could cover with as much project reference material as I could ever want. Here there is zero, so I had to come up with another way to keep these images, growing all the time, as the web relentlessly shows helpful shots to grab. It took a week, but I managed to go through all the images and sort out only the boards that still needed to be referred to, putting the things already done away-away.

The boards still in play were then sorted by subject, clipped together, and labeled with large masking tape flags. These are kept like a giant loose leaf book of sorts. They're kept upright in the closet, one in an old board portfolio, wedged between the paint caddies and the closet wall opposite the drawers.

As each subject needs to be looked at, I look through the "book", pull the bundle and will put them up on a clothes line or something near where working.

The room actually has gorgeous polished hardwood floors. But in order not to damage them while living here, we had a roll of Ram Board put down before anything else was moved into the studio. The other day I installed a $19 plain canvas drop cloth, using double-sided duct tape, over the $50 Ram Board in the middle of the room so I wouldn't have to read the words all over the Ram Board and see the black tape lines.

Now I can work in here without concern. It's a tighter fit. But will make it work.